


Hypertactile

by tielan



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Co-Sleeping, F/M, Post-Operation Pitfall (Pacific Rim)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-25 00:17:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17714423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/pseuds/tielan
Summary: Three drifts isn’t enough to scar someone; it shouldn’t have been enough to bond the way they have – or, rather, the way Raleigh has bonded with Mako.





	Hypertactile

**Author's Note:**

  * For [millepertuis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/millepertuis/gifts).



The days immediately after Pitfall are heaven for Raleigh.

He curls up in the infirmary bed with Mako, limbs comfortably tangled, the warmth of her skin against his palms, against his shoulder, against his cheek. Her heartbeat drums him to sleep at night and her grumbling murmur wakes him in the morning, and when she climbs out of the bed, he wants to catch her ankle and pull her back in, just so he can feel the slide of her skin against his.

It’s been five years since he had someone to reach for like this – since he and Yancy would sit shoulder to shoulder in the bed, or sprawl comfortably crosswise to each other, occasionally kicking the other because, well, they were brothers and they had legs. Five empty years working on the Wall among people who couldn’t give a damn, and if they had a damn to give, sure as hell wouldn’t have given it to Raleigh Becket.

Mako is everything he longed for in those years working on the Wall.

–

The first night back in his own quarters, Raleigh tosses and turns, too hot when he has the blankets on, too cold when he tosses them off.

He wants to go out from his room and knock on the door across the corridor. He wants the weight of her against him, the scent of her skin in his nose, the feeling that here is somewhere he belongs – someone he belongs to.

He doesn’t dare.

There’s an addictive component to the Drift – one part adrenaline, one part dopamine, one part sheer intimate rush of having someone else know you and accept you from your balls to your bones. It wasn’t advertised anywhere in the literature about the Drift, buried beneath layers and layers of security, privacy laws, and disclosure agreements, yet it was known well enough among Jaeger pilots.

Sometimes the Drift went toxic – emotionally and psychologically, if not physically. And when it did, the PPDC tended to look the other way because a working Drift connection – even a fucked-up, psychologically scarring one – was better than none at all.

Three drifts isn’t enough to scar someone; it shouldn’t have been enough to bond the way they have – or, rather, the way Raleigh has bonded with Mako.

She said goodnight in the corridor earlier, and never looked back as she walked into her room and closed the door.

Whatever Raleigh feels, he feels alone.

–

Raleigh wakes up, groggy and disoriented.

He stares blankly at the timepiece, trying to make sense of the numbers and why they’re so high. He can read the time – past midday – he just doesn’t understand why he’s still in bed—

It hits with the force of the broken Drift with Yancy, like a gusty blast of wind high up on the Wall. He’s still in bed because he slept in, and nobody came to wake him up. Nobody missed him.

 _Mako_ didn’t miss him.

For a few tense seconds, breathing is an effort, the loss as rending as Yancy’s death. Slowly, he comes back to himself, the brush of sheets against his skin, the faint light creeping in underneath the door, the gnawing hunger in his stomach that’s no match for the aching emptiness in his chest.

Raleigh turns on the light and sits up, trying to settle himself, trying to settle his soul. It doesn't work, but he begins the process of getting ready for the day anyway.

–

Showered and shaved and clothed, Raleigh glances at the timepiece again. Lunch is still being served, he’ll get something to eat and go and find Mako, whatever she’s doing.

Only, when he pulls open the door, Mako’s just emerging from her room, too.

Their eyes meet, startled and bewildered. Her mouth drops open in a delicate ‘oh’ of surprise.

Raleigh drinks in the sight of her – clean uniform, fresh-faced. Her hair is damp, like it was only just washed and she hasn’t taken the time to dry it, and she looks...tired. Like she spent the night tossing and turning, unable to sleep in a bed that was once perfectly comfortable without him in it.

Is it possible? Could it be?

“ _Ohayou gozimasu,_ ” he says, and his throat feels raw. “Have you just woken?”

“Yes. ” She blinks. “You have only just come out?”

“I didn’t sleep.” Raleigh admits and takes a step out into the corridor, towards her. “Did you?”

“No. Not so well.” Mako looks away, then seems to shake herself, and lifts her gaze to him. “I missed you.”

Relief rushes through him, an adrenaline high. “I missed you, too, Mako. Maybe tonight...”

He hesitates. Is he being too forward? She’s the one who’s new to Drifting, who might not understand what this means to him. But she’s made the admission that she missed him last night, so maybe...

Mako speaks into the silence. “Maybe tonight we could share?”

“Yes. “ Raleigh watches her. “If you want.”

Her smile is slow but pleased. “I want.”

–

They don’t even make it to ‘tonight’.

Lunch is eaten sitting thigh to thigh at an empty table, and after going to see Tendo in LOCCENT and checking that there isn’t actually anything for them to do today, they go back to Mako’s room to sleep.

Raleigh strips down to his boxers, because he wants skin, and it’s fair that Mako should know the fullness of what she’s getting into – scars and hunger and all. And she blushes as she comes out and finds him half- naked in her bed, but she climbs in, her bare legs sliding smooth and sweet against his.

They shuffle in the small space, elbows, knees, hip, breast...

Mako shivers when Raleigh drops a kiss to her shoulder – and he feels the shiver in his own skin. And when she wriggles back against him, she pauses for a moment, then wriggles again – only slower, perhaps prolonging the twinge of pleasure that Raleigh feels at the press of her body against him.

“Comfy?” He murmurs against her nape.

She takes his arm and wraps it around her waist, his palm splayed on her belly. “Yes,” she says.


End file.
